This Forest I Roam
The disclaimer that applies to the whole series: Remus Lupin, his world and it's characters are the property of J.K. Rowling. There is no money being made off this fic.
Awakening
By Yuan
I'm being born.
It's wonderfully strange and extraordinarily rapturous. My mind seems to be coming out of a numbing haze, and I'm beginning to distinguish things like sounds and shapes. I know what many of them are, but to see and feel them for the first time is…fascinating. Like waking up after a long, long time. I suddenly register physical sensations that snap my attention to my changing body.
My limbs have turned and are just finishing angling themselves in the right positions, and my muscles are thick and sinewy. My fur has spread along my body and is growing rapidly into the thick, blanket of warmth that encases and protects my body from the biting chill in the air. My claws are strong and cruelly sharp, the claws of a hunter. In the space of two heartbeats, my senses sharpen; and my nostrils flare as the world comes to life.
I can smell the mold on wood, the tang of metal, the scent of my prey. The strongest smell is right beneath me, and all around me in the air. Male. Young, definitely young. My mouth waters and I turn in circles. Where? Where? Everywhere, but I can't follow his trail. I lower my muzzle to the ground and sniff, trying to sort through the myriad of scents on the ground.
Smells, human smells, along with dried dirt and underneath it all, old wood. Wait, wood? Why was there wood underneath me instead of the comforting feel of cold, moist soil, moss and leaves?
Never mind that now. I must focus before my quarry escapes me. The most recent smell is the smell of the human boy, it's strength is the evidence of that. But…yes, there's more.
Two more, female and male. They carry his scent. They are older than him, and unlike him, they left a trail. I follow it eagerly for a few feet to a solid wall of stone and wood. The smells go through it, to the other side. They're stronger on the wood than the stone. I sniff all over the solid block of wood and the sections of stone on either side.
No! I snarl angrily at the smooth, cold surface of the wood. They were here, I practically see them, taste them, the stupid slow human and his mate. They were here! I throw myself against the timber in a blind fury. It doesn't yield, sending another wave of rage over me as I ram it again. I attack it furiously with my claws, my beautiful sharp claws, and rumble in satisfaction as they slide smoothly through the wood and leave deep crevices in their wake.
I could claw the door for hours, but something is still bothering me. The young one. The boy. I trot back to the place where I took my first breath.
The scent had just stopped. It was as if he had just flown away like a bird, or vanished into thin air. I lower my muzzle. There is something familiar about the boy. He smells like a memory. Something I had smelt a long time ago. It was the strangest sensation, for prior to this night, I had not been alive. Prior to this night, I should have made no memories.
I don't understand. I don't understand and it's starting to scare me. I pace around the place where he had been standing and try to claw through the wood, in case he had somehow burrowed like a rabbit. I can't get through. The wood underneath the scent only smells like wood and the soil between the cracks only smells like soil. The boy couldn't have escaped underground.
I yelp in frustration and sniff all around the small enclosure, circling it twice. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I don't believe this.
Still rumbling low in my chest, I lift my leg at one of the corners of my prison and spray. This enclosure, useless and pitifully small as it may be, is mine.
I lie down over the scent of the boy creature. Maybe he'll come back. Maybe he'll come and I'll rip his small, young throat out and devour his flesh. His sweet, tender flesh. I close my eyes in ecstasy, and slight pain, for my teeth have begun to ache. I want to sink them into the boy and relieve of their pain in his demise. He shall be my first meal, the first lifeblood spilt to christen my new life as a hunter.
The air has gotten a little sweeter. I inhale deeply, trying to identify this new, indescribable smell. It's nothing I can attach an image to in my mind. I open my eyes and lift my head, ears twitching, hoping to see or hear what has entered my territory. My eyes are drawn up to the hole in the wall where bars made of hated metal are placed. I almost stop breathing.
It's perfect.
Perfectly round, perfectly pale, perfectly brilliant. It is suspended against the deep, dark cobalt blue of the sky and illuminates the clouds that surround it. The intensity with which it glows is so deceptively soft it could slip into a creature's chest and painlessly remove it's heart.
I rise to all fours. Blinking, I turn around in a circle as I realize I stand in a pool of this glorious light. It bathes my body, drenches my soul and the tips of my fur sparkle with silver.
I hear singing. Not through my ears, but in the back of my head, where it slowly trickles like water and floods my mind.
I throw my head back and howl. I howl and feel the air tremble with my power. I pour all of my soul into my song, in response to the unearthly call of the moon.
Yes, the moon. That is what is it is called. It is my protector, my lover, and my creator. Each time it reaches it's full, unveiled state, I will change and once again become my true form.
I know now, who the young boy child is. I now know why he feels like a memory I can't possibly have. He's me; my host, my patron, my other half. He's where I shall sleep while I wait for my reviver to complete it's cycles.
I let out a short, sharp snarl when I realize I cannot and will never eat him. I am his barrier against myself. Nor will I eat the two humans that carry his scent on theirs, his parents. The walls of my prison are their barriers against me.
I snap my jaws in the air. The thought of food, coupled with frustration have made my teeth ache more than ever. My throat thirsts for blood that will flood my parched mouth. Any blood…
I would howl, if my mouth weren't full. Pain and pleasure, pleasure and pain. Relief bought at a price. My right foreleg now bears bite marks, but my right foreleg has helped banish much of the ache in my teeth. My own blood is in my mouth and I swallow it, savoring my own taste.
I raise my head and cautiously take a step forward before falling to my side. A burst of pain from the still-healing muscle keeps me from going anywhere. Although I will recover completely from this wound, I will not be able to walk very far. Running is completely out of the question.
The moon feels good on my fur, but I realize the urge to bite has returned. It's hard not to ravage myself in hopes of getting rid of it completely, but the temporary handicap from my injury has taught me not to inflict more damage than I can recover quickly from. Or at least that's what I thought it did.
The moment I'm able to stand again, I bite one of my hind legs even harder than the foreleg. This time I do howl, as soon as I can stand to let go. It is a cry of mixed sentiments. Though the pain is worse and will take even longer to heal, the relief it brings is indescribable.
I close my eyes and raise my plaintive voice to the heavens. I can continue my cycle of biting and healing for the rest of the night, but it will not help the fact that I am hungry. It will not solve the problem of my being trapped in this prison, far away from the humans I am meant to devour. It will not banish the scent of the boy creature, which is driving me beyond madness with frustration, as I lay here with my bloody legs, unable to move.
I angrily snap my jaws on empty air one last time before I sink to the ground. I can't move, I can't think, I can't bear the pain. I'm not referring to the physical pain. I can handle torn muscle, broken limbs, and the like. But to be confined in this structure of cold stone and dead wood is something I can barely handle when I hear the wind in the trees outside and smell the tantalizing scents of the night…
I drop my head to the floor between my paws…
And close my eyes…
And escape.
---
The next morning, a kind man and his gentle wife quietly approach a stone shed from where they heard the howls of a wild animal all night. The man's face is pale and his wife's eyes are wide. She carries a blanket in her arms. They remove wands from their belts and take turns removing the wards that surround the shed. As the wife takes down the last ward, the husband approaches the barred entrance. His hands are shaking, but they manage to remove the bar and unlock the door. The woman steps forward and her husband nods, then moves aside for her to pass.
The odor of animal urine lingers in the air, making both of them cover their noses. The man's eyes quickly settle on a small hunched figure in a corner. He grabs his wife's hand and they run over. It is a sleeping boy, curled and bleeding and naked. The woman immediately kneels and wraps him in the blanket she has brought. She lifts him in her arms. The man touches the boy's hair lightly. Both of them have a sad, heavy look on their kind faces.
The man's eyes travel downward and he draws his wife's attention to the floor. Claw marks, jagged and splintered. Blood that has been streaked and dripped is dried into dark, menacing patterns. Neither of them wants to think about the creature that made them and they look away quickly.
They reach the door and the man lifts his hand, then pulls it back suddenly. The woman looks up from the boy's sleeping face and her hands clutch her son closer. Long, deep indentations run down the wood. The creature that had made the marks clearly had been trying to get out of the shed.
The couple stares at the marks for a minute, then at each other. The man wraps his arms around his wife's shoulders and their gaze travels down to the boy in the woman's arms. His eyes are shut tight too tightly for someone in sleep and his breathing is labored. The hands that clutch the blanket around him are curled into tight fists. The fear in couple's eyes slowly softens.
The man pushes the heavy wooden door open and his wife exits first. He follows her, then turns back and stares at the room. There's sunlight trickling through the bars of the window, faint but warm. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.
The door shuts without a sound.